Today I spent some time perusing the wonderful newspaper resources of the Library of Congress’ Chronicling America newspaper archive looking for possible articles relating to my great-grandfather in New York.

While that was exciting, I stumbled on an unrelated article from the March 9, 1913 edition of The Sun that was even more so! I tweeted a link to it before I even read much of the article, since it seemed interesting.

As I read onward, I learned that the Modern Historic Records Association

“…sent two envelopes of imperishable paper to each of its members. In these envelopes each family was requested to place a message to its descendants 100 years from the present date, to be opened in the year 2013. this message might consist of photographs of the family, a genealogical history going as far back as practicable, or anything else deemed worthy of transmission.”

That is quite interesting on its own, but I then found there was a further wrinkle to the plan:

“Duplicate copies were to be placed in the envelopes. The two sets of envelopes so collected were to be placed in an indestructible box. One of these boxes was to be deposited in the New York Public Library, the other in a chamber in one of the pyramids of Egypt. Both were to be opened just 100 years from the present date and the envelopes turned over to the descendants to whom they were addressed.”

As that plan sunk in, I began to get more excited. What could these men have written of? Where are their descendants now? Do others know of this plan still?

My tweet was then replied to by the @NYPL account (“whoa!”) and cc:d to their other historical collections tweeter accounts. Looks like I’m not the only excited one here.

I do hope something is found in relation to this project – and am left wondering what pyramid was supposed to be involved and if the plan was carried out fully.Updated on January 8, 2013 at 22:23:

I have done a bit more more digging on the Modern Historic Records Association, and was able to find a listing in the book that may reference the items given to the New York Public Library for this project:

Bulletin of the New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations , Volume 17 (1913), Page 118

While helping a friend find some records for her family, I learned of the terrible murder of Julia Connors in the Bronx in 1912.

The horrific story was one that not only took over the New York area, but from the large number of newspaper reports found over at Chronicling America in 1912, it spread across the country.

I do not wish to go into the details of the murder, and while it didn’t need any additional outrage to remain in the public’s eye, the case was fueled on by the facts that a local girl lied to the police about witnessing her that day and also by the subsequent suicide of her murderer.

We are glad to note that so many societies and orders of to-day are searching historical genealogy, not to find that the average American’s veins contain a minute drop of royal or noble blood transmitted from England, but in the spirit of preserving the memory of the great though humbly worked out deeds of our ancestors in the gloomy obscurities of the colonies in their forest-shadowed days. Pride in descent from men of the type of our early colonists is, we hold, entirely consistent with our democratic institutions. They were the pioneer Americans, men who under great discouragement and with vast labor planted strong and deep the foundations of the commonwealth. It is worth while to make this fact plan to our present population. There were great men before Agammemnon and there was a powerful country here built up by men of the Anglo-Saxon race before the great immigration movement of fifty years ago began.

About the Author

As I have discovered more evidence of my family’s immigrations and documentation of their lives, I have become entranced by the idea that while we live in different times we often travel similar paths. Read More